David is a retired US Marine Lt. Col. with real combat experience in Somalia and Iraq, where he commanded a unit of 1 200 soldiers. He then served as the Defence Attache to Latvia in Riga. Since retiring from the military David has been applying the lessons he shares in this episode to both secure millions of USD in contracts for the businesses he worked for as well as to teach leadership both in Europe and the US. 

It turns out there are more parallels in business and military than you may think. In this engaging episode, David shares the learnings from his military career that will help you in your day-to-day combat with deadlines, KPIs, and competitors.

By listening to this episode you will learn:

• To get enough sleep, otherwise, you’ll make bad decisions
• That stress for a person in a business can be as high or even higher than for a soldier, so needs to be addressed and managed to ensure performance
• To make a plan based on carefully considered assumptions, execute the plan, measure performance metrics and reiterate the plan
• To be serious about being good at your job - prepare, make notes and use them as cheat sheets in real business situations
• David’s 6 leadership principles
• The importance of clarity in communication. Especially in remote work times if needed, make the other person repeat what you said to ensure no miscommunication
• To set expectations on performance from the start and regularly articulate those expectations to achieve better performance from your team
• To never tolerate lies
• To invest your time and effort in creating a team identity
• Centralized planning and decentralized execution. Make sure your team knows what exactly needs to be done, and empower them to take care of how to do it 
• To reward initiative and accept failure instead of celebrating failure

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Liudas, a fintech heavyweight, got into RegTech and ID verification as he saw an industry with an exponential rise in relevance for global commerce. Having led a team of 1000+ people before (ex-CEO of Paysera), he is now scaling the Ondato team with rocket speed having grown 6x times in the last 12 months. Liudas shares his management secrets to keep his team aligned on one vision

By listening to this episode you will learn:

• Importance of having a co-founder as it is almost impossible to achieve success alone
• The realities of startup Founder/CEO lifestyle. Hint - it is a 24/7 job and it does not include a Lamborghini
• How to tackle the key challenges in scaling 
• Not to shy away from starting your business in a crowded space
• How to rally your team behind a vision
• How to grow as a CEO from managing 5 to 1000+ people
• Tips on how to ensure high-quality feedback from your team
• The future of the office, meetings, and human interactions
• That, not all VCs are relevant to your startup
• And why setting up your company in London makes sense

Find out more on https://www.pursuitofscrappiness.co/ 

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Raising $400 M in the first year of existence? This is the story of 4 companies in 2020 who grabbed a piece of $2.6 Bn investment pie. With 2 million third-party sellers on Amazon responsible for ⅔ of sales on its platform, the market is ripe for consolidation. The “John D. Rockefellers” of the Amazon black gold mean business and are buying and building Amazon sellers left, right, and center.

We also discuss the timeless quest to live longer from alchemy to  ‘ammortality’ with the industry poised to grow to $0.5 Tn. Wise is giving away stock to their most loyal users pre  IPO, robots are driving around Estonian countryside roads (presumably to bring you food from ghost kitchens, hint see Ep 02) and Apple finally decides to go into paid original  podcasting

Things you will learn from listening to this episode:

• What is a “rollup company”?
• How buying up sellers on Amazon works?
• Who are the biggest/ most visible players in the industry?
• What value do aggregator companies bring to the Amazon sellers?
• What kind of investors are funding the industry?
• Why are investors backing these companies?
• Is this business model scalable?
• What are the benefits for consumers?
• What are the inherent risks in the business model?
• Some extreme scenarios of how this industry might be upended
• Can you (as a private investor) participate?
• What is “ammortality” and the emerging industry of life longevity enhancement?
• Wise giving away shares - good PR or long-term trend in tech?

Highlights of the week

• Estonian AI&robotics startup Cleveron is cleared to use their fully autonomous delivery robots on all public roads in Estonia - the first company in Europe to get such nation-wide public streets green light
• Apple will introduce a subscription fee on the Apple podcasts app opening up questions on the balance of power in the podcast media industry

Find out more on https://www.pursuitofscrappiness.co/ 

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Elviss, a prodigy entrepreneur started Airboard at the age of 16 and takes us through his amazing story of following his dream of putting a man on a drone. Having raised initial funds in Latvia, Elviss shares his experience in the Silicon Valley over two accelerator programs, being mentored by Tim Draper and raising funds from angels from different parts of the world. He also shares his pivot from civil transport to agriculture, making first sales and getting outrun by huge US competitors. A story of ultimate scrappiness awaits!

By listening to this episode you will learn:

• How to build a business when the technology for your business doesn’t exist
• How to transition from the only engineer/product person to a CEO
• The value of going to Silicon Valley and the US accelerators
• Advice Elviss received from Tim Draper - always go for the market with the most money
• How to set up shop in the US and stick around
• How to transition from fundraising to sales mentality
• That being a CEO means eating last every day

Find out more on https://www.pursuitofscrappiness.co/ 

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Global Education and Training is estimated to be a 7tn$ industry by 2025, but only 4% of it is digital. S^&t is about to go down. 

We also list ways to get financing for your startup without getting diluted, give a quick tip on how you can become a VC by buying shares in a Baltic Nasdaq listed investment fund, and try real hard to recall a successful Kickstarter campaign that has since grown into a major company.

Should you go for a 4-year degree from Google in 6 months now available at $39 per month?  Does it make sense to do equity crowdfunding for a B2B SaaS company? Find out in the latest episode!

Things you will learn from listening to this episode:

Remote education:

• There are not many ways for Big Tech to add hundreds of billions in revenue in order to keep growing their share price. Meanwhile, global Education and Training is estimated to be a 7tn$ industry by 2025 (and only 4% of it is digital)...
• VC Investment in EdTEch doubles during the pandemic to reach 16.1 bn$ in 2020
• Existing universities to provide an increasing number of remote and hybrid programs
• Coursera IPOs at 7bn last week offering a platform to get fully remote degrees & certificates from accredited brands. Google offers it at $39 per month, but you can also get an online degree from HEC Paris - full price, sorry, no shortcuts there. Yet.

Alternatives to VC funding:

• In the earliest stages, nothing beats a good bootstrap
• Competition among investors for Baltic startups has intensified with the emergence of strong angel syndicates as well as a growing number of active foreign investors
• Crowdfunded companies historically have struggled to grow into global businesses
• Equity crowdfunding is a good funding mechanism for consumer products, especially if the consumers have investable assets
• Angel syndicates are competing with VCs for Seed and Series A deal flow in the Baltics
• There are new completely non-dilutive fundraising methods like revenue-based lending and selling of SAAS/subscription contracts

Highlights of the week

• New early-stage investor - Baltic Tech Ventures - is listed on Nasdaq Baltic meaning that you can now become an investor in a VC fund
• 3 Nordic startups in Top 6 of Europe-wide rankings of the most well-funded startups in each country (and 2 Baltic unicorns in Top 11) by CB Insights

Find out more on https://www.pursuitofscrappiness.co/ 

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Vytautas, a serial entrepreneur, and investor caught the crypto bug in 2015. After realizing that, like most things, his P2P lending business should not be put on a blockchain, he went and established a completely different business in crypto. After spending the last 3 months working from Bali and learning to surf, Vytautas has had revelations that fundamentally changed the way he looks at the office as we know it and what it means to have a work/life balance.

By listening to this episode you will learn:

• 5:50 - The process of pivoting your product 
• 12:30 - Starting to buy crypto in 2015
• 17:10 - Why they didn't go for an ICO with a working product that potentially could raise millions on 2017
• 24:30 - Remote work culture and managing team from Bali and is remote work culture scalable when growing the company
• 31:05 - Maintaining work-life balance. DO what you want to do and be happy
• 39:35 - Balancing 24/7 access to markets and freedom of investing with consumer protection (mostly from themselves)
• 49:10 - Losing money while margin trading
• 50:00 - What are NFTs, what problems are they solving and why they could become a killer application for blockchain
• 1:06:10 - The future of P2P lending business model in the Baltics and in general

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We dig deeper into two fintech verticals - stock investing apps and the business model of Robinhood as well as Buy Now Pay Later (BNPL) and the reasons why Klarna is Europe’s most valuable private fintech company.

Should you start a new stock investing fintech and will we stop paying full price for goods immediately as the new norm in shopping? Find out in the latest episode!

Things you will learn from listening to this episode:

Stock investing apps:

• Why does it matter and what are the reasons behind its scorching growth?
• What is payment for order flow and what does it have to do with Bernie Madoff?
• What are the incentives and conflicts of interest in the Robinhood business model?
• What demographic factors shape this market in the US and in Europe?
• Who are the main emerging players?
• Does it make sense to start a new company in this space in Europe?
• How can you as a consumer get to trading stocks?

BNPL:

• What is the business model of Klarna, the pioneer of this industry?
• What’s in it for consumers and retailers?
• Why has this business model not taken off in the Baltics yet?
• Who are the likely entrants in this space in Baltics and which major companies can be expected to diversify into this business line?

Highlights of the week

• Our first guest Toms Niparts and Jeff App raises 1mUSD 
• Estonian co-founded InsureTech Zego hits unicorn numbers with 1.1bnUSD valuation in the latest round

Find out more on https://www.pursuitofscrappiness.co/ 

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Eerik (EE) and his partner Marten (EE) co-founded Planet42 in 2017 in Johannesburg, South Africa. They started by borrowing money from their friends to buy and rent cars to people who otherwise would not have access to credit. Talk about taking risks. Since then, Planet 42 has raised USD 20 million from both VCs as well prominent tech entrepreneurs and is on its way to expand to Mexico this year. 

By listening to this episode, you will learn:

• How to build a sustainable corporate culture through radical honesty and kindness
• Hiring Mr. Right vs Mr. Right Now
• Importance of having the right co-founder
• Network effects fo hiring good people
• Picking the right market for your product and ignoring geographical shortcuts
• How to balance running day-to-day operations of the company with fundraising and market expansion
• Prepare for the inevitable arrival of competition to a blue ocean by improving your own game
• How to avoid burnout while building your startup

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We discuss 2 things that have seen a meteoric rise in March - Bitcoin and hundreds of millions of Euros in venture capital investments pouring into instant food delivery in Europe

Will Uldis spend his government stimmy checks to buy Bitcoin and why is Janis so excited about strangers in gorilla costumes bringing cookies to his apartment? Find out in the latest episode

Bitcoin:

• Reasons why holding Bitcoin on your company’s balance sheet could be the most rational thing you can do in the current economy
• And reasons why you shouldn’t do it 
• Tesla made more profit from Bitcoin than from selling cars, but is the current price sustainable in long term?
• Skip the overly technical whitepapers - 4 resources that will help you to learn more about crypto

Food tech:

• Why ‘dark stores’ and ‘ghost kitchens’ are not titles of shitty horror B-movies, but actually a good thing
• 2 companies founded in 2020 raise close to 100M together to deliver groceries to your door in 10 minutes
• With tens of millions of EUR up for grabs potentially in the Baltics who will do that here?
• Will people return to stores when Covid neds or will ‘One app to deliver them all’ rule the land

Highlights of the week:

• A new investment fund in Baltics 
• 51M for Estonian deep tech company

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In our first interview, we are excited to welcome Toms Niparts the Co-Founder and CEO of Jeff-app.com - a matchmaker between people and loans that gathers and utilizes alternative data to help unbanked consumers in Asia access financial services. 

Toms shares his experience of starting a business remotely on the other side of the world, tips on hiring the top talent with a strong cultural fit as well as insights into the future of fintech and consumer apps. Move fast and break things, but don’t forget to set metrics to measure what you’re breaking. 

By listening to this episode you will learn:

• Starting a business fully remotely in a different continent, is it possible?
• Why hiring is the #1 priority for early-stage startups and what are some practical tricks to manage the hiring efficiently and sort through hundreds of applications
• What growth strategies worked for Jeff in getting new customers in Asia without having a huge marketing budget
• What are the key responsibilities of a startup CEO 
• What chapters from Ben Horowitz’s playbook helped Toms to build his company culture
• How to balance product obsession with cold, hard metrics
• Why Square just bought Tidal
• And last, but not least - will having Jack Dorsey’s beard help you to fundraise

Find out more on https://www.pursuitofscrappiness.co/ 

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